Thine Hatred To Crown
by Yeade
Summary: Every once in a while, the Master of Laketown had Bard brought to his bed as an object lesson on their respective positions. After Bard becomes King of Dale, he begins a relationship with Thorin, whom he eventually tells something of his past. Thorin, furious, dishes out a very generous serving of bloody cold revenge.


This is my very first time writing Thorin and the Dwarves in any detail, not to mention the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Five Armies, so the chapter caused me... some anxiety. I could probably do with a bit of dedicated research into the history and culture of the Dwarves, both canon and fanon, rather than relying on my general knowledge of _The Lord of the Rings_ appendices and what I've gleaned from other people's stories, but I was impatient to begin. As it happens, I have need of haste because the word count has doubled, _at least_, from that of Chapter 2 (Yeade on AO3). Which means, yep, there's more to come, despite the length of this section!

Per the prompt from the Hobbit Kink Meme (hobbit_kink on LJ), there will eventually be non-graphic **discussion of rape**. This is, however, towards the end of the chapter and has yet to be written. Until then, the fic can easily be read as gen or pre-slash edging ever so slowly into an unexpected romcom, with no warnings. Well, aside from one for the angst that's pretty standard for post-BOFA stories from Thorin's perspective, especially as I've tried to be as canon conscious as possible within the limits of this AU mash-up of book and film.

* * *

><p><strong>· · ·<strong>

**Thine Hatred To Crown**

_Thorin_

**· · ·**

Revenge should have no bounds.  
>— <em>Hamlet<em>, Act IV, Scene VII

**· · ·**

Thorin Oakenshield had not been given to rashness since he reclaimed Erebor to rule as King Under the Mountain. When he'd first awoken after the battle, he had thought only of making amends before death took him: To Bilbo, whose brave service in a cause not his and friendship, _care_, deserved a better turn than to be summarily accused a traitor, threatened and exiled. To Fíli and Kíli, whose voices as survivors of Laketown's ruin and as his heirs, his closest kin, should have carried more weight in his counsels. And to the rest of his company, whose honor and loyalty had demanded that they stand with him to the end, no matter how bitter an end he made. Even to Bard, whose singleminded determination to see his people done right by Thorin could respect, the will that had, wed to skill and luck, at last laid low Smaug the Magnificent.

Upon what he was certain would be his deathbed, a deep, persistent ache in his chest that was too dulled to be anything but a mercy meant to ease his passing, Thorin found that the wrongs he'd taken such offense at in his stiff-necked pride—the snarling beast under his skin that would suffer no slights nor ever bow to another's power—did not amount to so very much when balanced on the scales against his own sins and the wonder of Erebor finally, finally restored. He would not be able to see the latter through, he thought, with less regret than he expected, but the former was within his ability to redress. _Unless..._

Thorin sat up with a wrench, only to fold in pain, a wetness spreading beneath the bandages wound tight around his bare torso as his flesh tore anew, his ribs grinding. He hated the choked scream that clawed its way up out of his throat, so weak, so helpless, when the fates of everyone he cared for were unknown to him. _Do they yet live?_ His vision swam, blackening at the edges. Panting harshly, he fisted his hands in the blankets to keep himself from falling back down onto the bed. _They must..._ A struggle he ultimately lost, like so many others, along with his consciousness, but not before Bofur's hat came into view, bobbing anxiously at his side and presumably safe atop Bofur's head. _One_, Thorin counted, his relief trailing him into the dark, a bright spark.

When next he woke, it was to Óin's touch, gentle but firm, careful and knowledgeable. _Two._ "—needs to rest. Healing can't be rushed, especially after some fool tears his stitches trying to get up from bed." Though Thorin's ears felt stuffed with wool and his eyelids as heavy as if they were carved of stone, he had no trouble recognizing Óin's exasperated healer's voice, which was so often accompanied by a fearsome scowl at his uncooperative patients. "This Elvish medicine, though... Say what you will about the Elves, they've more skill in the arts physic than any other race." A sigh. "He won't be pleased to owe them his life."

"But he will live," said a second voice, bluntly pragmatic, "and that is all that matters." Suddenly, a rolling laugh, as welcoming as a fire blazing in the hearth on a cold winter's night. _Glóin_, thought Thorin, warmed. _Three._ "Now I'm sure he'll recover. See how he frowns at being in debt to those..." Sleep dragged him down again.

Not until his third awakening was Thorin truly aware. It was night when he slowly blinked his way into consciousness. He lay in bed still, the off-white fabric of a canvas tent stretched overhead. There was a candle lit on the makeshift table beside him and a quiet presence. What had been a muted ache in his chest had seeped into his limbs and swelled into a gnawing pain, so fierce it robbed Thorin of breath as it crested at every movement, but he turned his head, gritting his teeth against his body's protests. Ori—_four_—sat on a stool, head bent, engrossed in...

He was knitting, Thorin decided, bemused, long wooden needles dipping deftly as he wove together thick strands of yarn, blue as a robin's egg. Where he had found yarn and needles Thorin could not guess, though he was grateful for it, glad that this youngest member of his company was not so hardened by war that he no longer took pleasure in the soft, steady weft and warp of good wool. Ori's eyes were shadowed, an angry scar running jagged down the left side of his face from temple to chin, and propped on the bed was a pair of crutches.

_Ori_, Thorin tried to say, but his mouth was dry, his tongue a numb weight, and he could only manage a pitiful croak. He was heard, nevertheless; Ori's head snapped up, his eyes widening. "You... Y-You're awake!" he stammered, hastily setting his knitting down on the bed so he could flutter both hands over Thorin's bandaged wounds. "Oh, drat it! What did Óin say to do if..." Trailing off, Ori studied the motley array of glasses, jars, and bottles on the table, gaze finally settling on a cup of water, already filled, a pitcher next to it. "Yes, of course!" He scooted his stool closer before holding the cup to Thorin's chapped lips with one hand, the other cradling Thorin's head. "Drink," said Ori, and Thorin obeyed, dazedly wondering when Ori had learned to command like Balin, unyielding as the bulk of the Misty Mountains for all that his tone was courteous and honeyed milk to the ears.

The water helped, and Thorin's mind cleared, though pain frayed his thoughts at the edges. He wanted to ask who else yet lived but, suddenly, he feared, doubts of his own strength touching his heart like icy fingers. Could he bear to hear that Bilbo was dead, his curly head cloven into a red mass of bone and gristle by an orc blade? That Balin and Dwalin, who'd survived the slaughter of Azanulbizar, had fallen? That Fíli or Kíli...

_Whatever other failings I am guilty of, cowardice has never been one of them._ Thorin was startled by the brush of wool against his knuckles, fleecy and feathery fine; he'd twisted the blankets up until Ori's knitting rested within reach. Weak, he couldn't stop himself from smoothing his hand over the yarn, again and again, the neat rows of stitches looping beneath his palm a small comfort. _I am not my father._ The thought rang hollow. Had he not believed the same about his grandfather's madness? Forcing the words past the lump in his throat, Thorin said, "Ori, tell me what—" He couldn't continue, a cough grating across the underside of his ribs as it pushed the air from his lungs.

Ori, brows drawn together in concentration, was stirring with a spoon the carefully measured contents of several bottles in a glass, the sides of which were stained by repeated use of the thin dark brown syrup. At Thorin's half-finished question, he glanced over, eyes falling on how Thorin's hand lay upon his knitting before darting away back to the foul concoction he no doubt intended to feed Thorin in short order.

"What I'm doing with knitting?" he said, with a nervous laugh. "I'm no good hauling stone with the work crews, you see, having to lug those"—he jerked his head at his crutches—"around. Óin's got me mixin' up medicines for him, and I saw some of the Men are coming down sick with the chills, nothing but the clothes on their backs to wear, so I went lookin' and—what do you know?—there was still yarn fit for knitting, that the moths hadn't eaten all to threads, in one of the lower storage rooms." Another nervous laugh. Ori talked in a rush, words tumbling one over the next, and his voice was high, squeaking, his shoulders hunched up almost to his ears. "Been keepin' busy knitting when Óin's got no use for me, which is most o' the day, to tell it true. A lot of scarves, since those are the quickest to do, even for them too tall Men, some hats, some mittens..."

Thorin frowned. That was not what he meant, and Ori... Letting the technical intricacies of knitting wash over him, Thorin noted how Ori avoided his gaze, head ducked, fingers fidgeting against the glass they held. _And he knows it well._ A cold suspicion grew in his gut—a hard, roiling ball of ill feeling that sent creeping tendrils of unease throughout his body. _What does he seek to hide from me?_ He could not move, could not breathe, dread twining around his chest and limbs, his throat, a strangling vine. Ori's eyes rounded with alarm, and he fumbled to bring the glass to Thorin's lips. "Drink," he said again, less command than plea this time. Thorin would've refused until he had his answers, but Ori whispered, "_Please_," and no member of his company should ever have to beg such a thing of him. He drank.

Óin's tonic for fever, aches and pains was as vile as he remembered from the aftermath of his more dangerous youthful follies, bitter and of a strange consistency that was slimy and sticky both at once. Thorin grimaced, fighting not to gag, as Ori fiddled aimlessly with the jars and bottles on the table, rearranging them. _You will not escape me so easily_, he thought, grimly determined, though not without pity for Ori as the reluctant bearer of what was certainly bad news.

But even as his mouth shaped a demand to know all that had happened since he fell on the battlefield, the heaviness of sleep spread insidiously through his arms and legs. _I've been tricked._ The look of relief on Ori's face was plain despite his increasing muzziness and drooping eyelids.

Right before he lost consciousness—_again_, a fact he was beginning to resent—the tent flap opened, admitting another visitor. "Ori, Nori told me you'd missed supper, so—" No matter that the voice stopped mid-sentence, Thorin had heard enough to identify the speaker, a little fussy and tone one of motherly concern. Dori made... _Five._ It was a struggle to focus. _And... Nori, too. Six._ Half the Dwarves of his company accounted for. Better than he feared but still so much less than he hoped.

"I couldn't—" Ori's breath hitched. "H-How are we going to tell him?" A sharp twist of worry pierced Thorin's cloudy distance at the hiccuping sounds that came from Ori, soft and stifled. _Tell me what?_ he wondered absently.

Dori padded closer, setting something down on the table. After a long moment, Ori's sobs gentling into sniffles, Dori said only, "Eat your greens, Ori." It was kindly said but sad. And Thorin slept with the ghost of his father's hand upon his head, warm and broad, smoothing over his hair as they talked solemnly of how Mother had gone to stay in the halls of Mahal, father to all their people. _"A beautiful place, my son, grander even than the Mountain, where she shall be waiting, smiling, to welcome us home when the day comes."_

The bright light of the midday sun shone white through the tent fabric when he woke again, alone and feeling irritable. He would not swallow another of Óin's confounded potions—and no amount of pleading would sway him!—until someone told him in no uncertain terms how fared his sister-sons, Master Baggins, and the remaining four members of his company who'd yet to show themselves. Teeth gritted, Thorin built up a blistering head of steam to unleash on his next nursemaid. Which was utterly deflated by the welcome sight of Dwalin's tall, wide-shouldered frame in the entrance, clean-shaven head gleaming proudly.

"Good," said Dwalin with little ado. " 'Bout time you woke." He inspected Thorin with a gimlet eye that he'd learned from their former armsmaster while Thorin stared at Dwalin, thankful that some thoughtful soul had propped him up so he wasn't flat on his back like, Thorin admitted sourly, the invalid he probably was. The pain had receded into a dull ache once more, with the occasional twinge, easily ignored, but this reprieve felt lasting, less a mercy granted to the dying. _And I'll need my strength._ This was Dwalin at his most difficult, scowling fit to send a legion of orcs running for the dank holes they crawled from and ornery as a bear with a sore paw. _Or a mother with cubs to defend._ Thorin nearly smiled at the old jab.

"Dwalin—" Thorin rasped, his breath catching in his throat before he could say more, though what he didn't know. His eyes burned, and he blinked furiously. Besides the addition of a bevy of new scars, thin and faded, across his knuckles, Dwalin was unchanged, as familiar to Thorin as a warm coat worn comfortable by years at his back, shielding him from wind, rain, and snow. He could not bring himself to be the least bit intimidated by Dwalin's black mood or his stomping prowl around the tent, as if checking the corners for spies and assassins.

The bowl of broth that Dwalin thrust into his hands was a surprise, however. It was half filled with the simple soup the healers were fond of—nine parts water, salt, and herbs, one part assorted boiled beans and vegetables ground into a fine paste. There was no spoon.

"Eat." Dwalin nodded at the broth, voice gruff and a challenging glint in his eye. "Balin'll be here soon with business for you to see to." Having apparently said his piece, Dwalin showed Thorin his back and stood like a stone sentinel, arms crossed, glaring, Thorin imagined, at one canvas wall. With a frustrated growl—he would pry no answers from Dwalin now—Thorin tested the weight of the wooden bowl in his hands.

He was weaker than he supposed, arms trembling to lift the bowl the mockingly short distance to his lips when before they'd wielded hammer and sword untiringly for hours. It took all his concentration not to spill the soup. Thorin knew he should be grateful for the first food he'd been able to feed himself in days, maybe weeks, a warming broth that was nourishing as well as tastier by far than Óin's medicines, and that Dwalin hadn't decided to set him a harder task, with a larger bowl or, worse, a full one, contents hotter. But it'd never been in Thorin to be satisfied counting his blessings. His hands clenched around the bowl, shaking, as he fought to tip it high enough to drink the dregs.

When he was finally finished, his strength sapped, he would've dropped the bowl end over end had not firm, callused hands cupped his, steadying his tired fingers against the sanded wood. "You'll do," said Dwalin, tugging the bowl from Thorin's unresisting grasp with a strange, quiet care. Thorin's heart stuttered, remembering a younger Dwalin meticulously cleaning rent armor and broken weapons of blood in the sun-silvered waters of the Kibil-nâla. So that the slain could be accorded all honors upon the funeral pyres, he'd explained, thumb rubbing slow circles over a dent in Fundin's helm, washing away grime until the metal glistened.

"Dwalin, _tell me_—" But Dwalin had turned towards the entrance. Where, Thorin was startled to see, stood Balin, hair a white halo around his face, his expression grave. Without another word, Dwalin left them, a slump in his usually straight back and the bluff, bracing presence that had filled the tent when he first arrived nowhere in evidence, subdued. He clasped his brother's shoulder momentarily in parting. He did not once glance at Thorin.

Balin seated himself on the stool at Thorin's bedside, movements careful. For all that he was the oldest of Thorin's companions, a promising young councilor, whose talent for diplomacy had already been marked, in the service of Thorin's grandfather when Thorin was but a stripling, Balin had never looked so weary as he did now. His skin was paper-thin in the light, fragile and webbed with cracks, sleepless nights of worry etched in deep lines on his brow and at the pulled down corners of his mouth. Thorin tensed as he waited for the blows to come, his breathing shallow. Balin, at least, spared him the agony of asking again, desperate for even bad news.

More than a week, almost two, had passed since the battle. Thorin had lain unconscious for most of that time—at the advice of the Elven healers who wrested him from death's grip, Balin told him, to lessen the pain of his recovery and the stresses on his mending body—in the camp on the edges of Dale with the other grievously wounded. The bulk of the Elven army and the Men of arms who were still able had removed farther south and west in close pursuit of the fleeing goblins, that had not drowned in the River Running. By Thranduil's latest messengers, they'd driven their routed foe into the marshes about the Forest River, where it was expected the greater part of the fugitives would shortly be slain. The survivors, wrote the Elvenking, were free to make their escape into the trees. There they would be hunted at leisure by the roving forest patrols, if they did not fall prey to Mirkwood's darker denizens first or simply perish of thirst and hunger in the trackless shadows.

While no love did Thorin bear for the Wood Elves or their king, whose haughty voice grated at his patience even heard thirdhand, their hatred for the goblins could not be questioned, burning cold and bitter. Thranduil would not rest until the blades of his warriors had been stained black with the blood of every last goblin in these lands. _Good_, Thorin thought viciously. On ridding the world of this blight, he and the Elvenking agreed.

Dáin was dead. Fallen in his defense.

His cousin had fought to reach his side, red ax hewing a path through the enemy, when Thorin finally succumbed to the injuries he'd sustained in his final combat with Azog. _May the carrion crows feast on his pale carcass._ Dáin had stood his ground against the pack of wargs that came ravening. Mounted upon their backs was Bolg's guard, orcs of monstrous size wielding steel scimitars, tasked by Bolg with retrieving his father's body and taking the head of his father's killer. One after another, orc and warg died beneath Dáin's ax, until he was spattered black from iron helm to iron-shod boots. He bled from dozens of cuts, large and small, swaying on his feet in hurt or exhaustion or both, when Bolg himself dealt the fatal blow.

Thorin had been saved the same fate and Dáin avenged by Beorn. The skinchanger had appeared unlooked for, in his bear shape, and crushed Bolg with a single snap of his great jaws, his wrath a living thing that doubled, trebled his size until he seemed a giant. He bore Thorin to safety out of the fray, then swiftly returned to it, the tide of the battle turning.

The goblins, now leaderless and with Beorn moving unopposed through their ranks like a scythe through ripe wheat, broke formation, scattering in all directions, seized by a senseless terror. And so began the relentless chase of many days. Thorin listened in amazement as Balin recounted what was already becoming known among the more poetically inclined Men as the Battle of Five Armies. Never would he have guessed that isolated, reclusive Beorn would rush to the rescue of the beleaguered armies of Elves, Men, and Dwarves. Nor that the Eagles would marshal their forces and fly from their eyries high in the Misty Mountains with numbers not seen since the Elder Days. _Truly, worthy deeds that will live long, celebrated in tale and song._ It was reckoned by some that fully three-quarters of the Wilderland's orcs and goblins had been put to the sword, though Balin felt that overoptimistic.

As for Dáin, Thorin found that, saddened as he was by his cousin's death, he was not grieved. Durin's heirs had ever died hard and often young in this darkening age, and Dáin had not gone quietly but standing tall, his bloodied ax in hand, the bodies of his slain foes strewn at his feet like so much chopped kindling in a deed that would be told and retold over many a tankard of ale in many a hall, inn, and tavern. _Durin's folk will see to that_, thought Thorin. _And Beorn tells of how Dáin lived to see his vengeance upon Bolg._ Thorin hoped Dáin had breathed his last knowing that the day was won and Erebor reclaimed for their people.

"Dáin lay in state for three days in the upper audience chamber," reported Balin, "which, fortunately, was in need of no more than a thorough scrubbing and replacement of the hangings with some Nori had dug up out of storage." Thorin remembered that room, a smaller version of the Gallery of Kings on the lower levels, generally used for more intimate occasions when the King Under the Mountain was hosting his closest kinsmen, and deemed it fitting. "The Company took turns standing the watches as honor guard, alongside Dáin's surviving captains."

"And what arrangements have been made for Dáin's burial?" Thorin asked. He would gladly see his cousin laid to rest deep beneath the Mountain but was uncertain whether Dáin's widow and son—his namesake, Thorin dimly realized—would prefer that their fallen lord be brought home to the Iron Hills that he'd ruled for over a century and Náin and Grór before him.

Balin's ear, as always, did not miss the unspoken. "Dáin's wish was to be entombed beside his father and grandfather," he said. "An escort of twenty-four left a week past to bear his body back to the Iron Hills." Of the some six hundred Dwarves Dáin had led, a third had fallen on the field of battle and been buried under stone cairns in the eastern foothills of the Mountain, from where they could greet the dawn each morning and gaze homewards.

The enemy dead were yet being cleared from the ruins of Dale in their thousands and consigned by the cartload to the cleansing flames of a mass pyre far downwind of the camp. Burning day and night, the fires had been started with and were fed from Erebor's vast stores of lamp oil rather than the precious little wood that survived in the Desolation. These unlikely trees included stunted apple orchards that Bard nonetheless hoped might one spring blossom again and fruit.

Another overoptimistic view of the future, perhaps, but no one begrudged the Lakemen their plans to resettle Dale. Not with hundreds of husbands, fathers, and sons upon the slow funeral barges that were rafted down the River Running by the Elves, who had no small number of their own slain to lay to rest in the cool shade of their beloved beeches. Balin's voice cracked when he spoke of the dirges the Elves sang as they went about their solemn duty. An unearthly sound it was, he told Thorin, eyes distant. Their fair immortal voices carried over the water, clear as cut crystal and rounded smooth, the lilting, weaving notes of the melody lingering in the air long after they'd passed, like a ringing of silver bells in an empty room walled in seamless, flawless stone. The work crews would stop to listen, even the Dwarves, who mourned in silence by custom. Their songs were meant for the living alone, whether raucous drinking tunes or melancholy hymns full of memory.

Shaking his head and refocusing, Balin continued, "The work crews have made quick progress clearing the barricade and debris from the front entrance and hall. From surveys of the adjoining rooms, we will not be without sound shelter this winter, but the damage done to the treasure chambers and foundries by Smaug while pursuing us is... considerable."

Then, incredibly, a hint of a smile, frail and tremulous, curled in Balin's beard. Thorin was heartened to see this slightest sign that his old friend's sly humor was not lost. "The gold plating the floor in the Gallery of Kings must be removed, as well, of course. It is far too soft a metal to stand wear and a distracting temptation besides to every visitor who would make off with a chunk or two." Thorin grimaced at that, feeling chagrined, though he could hardly be blamed for not thinking of the cleanup at the time, a live and _angry_ dragon at his heels.

Expression grave once again, Balin said, "There is also some... dissatisfaction among Dáin's followers." At Thorin's sharp glance, he added hastily, "They are all of them loyal Dwarves and true—of that, there can be no doubt—and they are agreed that, had a bargain not been struck with Bard, leaving the Arkenstone in the hands of those who'd come by it against the king's will and laid siege to the Mountain... Those were insults that could not be borne." Balin paused, stroking his beard in what Thorin had learned years ago was a nervous gesture. "But since the battle, there has been much converse between the armies, and having heard of events in Laketown and of the parley before the gates from the Men, many have begun to wonder how it is that the Arkenstone found its way to Bard and _why_."

Thorin rubbed a weak hand over his face. _And so the mistakes of the past continue to haunt me._ His fears were realized when Balin finished, "There are murmurings, though quiet still, of Thrór's name and of Thráin's. And of the folly of the march on Khazad-dûm, his opposition to which Dáin has never sought to hide."

Dwalin and Glóin had both been privately furious at Dáin's refusal to support Thorin's quest, holding his decision to be cowardly, borderline treasonous, and Balin disappointed, if not surprised. While Thorin had hoped for more than a promise of reinforcements should he prove successful, neither could he condemn Dáin's caution. Unlike all his cousins but Thorin himself, Dáin had to look first and foremost to his people. The Dwarves of the Iron Hills had answered an exiled King Under the Mountain's call to arms before and mustered their strength to reclaim an ancestral home long lost to a terrible evil...

_To meet with failure and death._ Thrór, Thráin, Frerin, Fundin—they were not the only losses the House of Durin suffered that day. Náin, too, had fallen, leading a score of warriors on a sortie that reached the very doorstep of Moria. None but his son lived. And of what he saw in Moria's black depths, Dáin refused to speak, save for once the morning after the battle, his face gray, to counsel that entering Khazad-dûm be put from their minds. _"Within the shadows, a greater shadow waits for us still that cannot be overcome by any power of ours."_

_Durin's Bane_, Thorin mused. The ancient foe that had driven them in flame and smoke from their great kingdom, lurking in the darkness. _Just as Smaug did. And not by Dwarves was the dragon slain._ That his part was less one of hero than that of villain was a bitter realization. His surety in the rightness of his actions had burned fever-hot through every fiber of his being when he treated with his enemies at the gates, his grandfather's crown heavy upon his head, but now he doubted, wondering whether that fire was fueled by greed instead of outrage.

When three days and three nights had gone with no sign of the dragon, a premonition of Smaug's fate crept into Thorin's heart, the silhouette of the windlance against a leaden sky clear in his mind and the grim visage of Girion's heir, hands steady as he peered down the length of an arrow at what had so unexpectedly washed up on the banks of the Forest River. Bilbo argued then that one or two of the Company should be sent to Laketown to see how matters stood there. Glóin had offered to make the daylong trip, as had Bifur and Bombur, but Thorin dissuaded them, saying that he needed their eyes to search for the Arkenstone, without which he had not the authority to summon the clans unchallenged to Erebor's defense, whether against Smaug or the treasure seekers who'd rob them of all that their people had labored to build once word spread that the dragon's hoard lay unguarded.

"We can do nothing for them now," he'd said gently to Bilbo and Glóin's worried faces, Bifur and Bombur at their sides in silent support. "Let us finish the task we set out to do and make safe the Mountain. If"—fear for Fíli and Kíli threatened to choke him but, no, _no_, he refused to believe his sister-sons dead—"they live still, they will know to come here."

After a tense moment, Glóin nodded reluctantly, Bifur and Bombur deferring to his judgment, as well; Bilbo was pale, lips pressed into a thin, unhappy line, but he did not ask of Laketown or of those left behind again. Their discontent showed only in how, though they scoured the heaps of gold and silver, gems, and other precious things for the Arkenstone with Thorin, when time came to rest, they climbed the ramparts above the main gates in unspoken agreement and looked southwards. Visible on the horizon past the ruins of Dale was the blue smear of Long Lake, a hazy plume of smoke rising above it.

Part of Thorin wanted to join them in their vigil, hands flat on the parapet so he could lean out, eyes straining for a glimpse of Fíli's bright hair, Kíli at his brother's side. Walking with a bit of a limp, perhaps, but unaided and growing stronger with each step towards home. But Thorin would not allow himself the comfort of clinging to his hopes. Not when he had a kingdom to secure for them all.

And so he spent his waking hours in the treasure chambers, sifting through his grandfather's vast wealth—his, now—handful by handful, stopping only to eat and sleep, his gaze still hunting for a fugitive glimmer of radiant white as he chewed his meals of tasteless _cram_ and his bed an uncomfortable one of gold. He found many a wondrous example of his people's craft but never that most valuable jewel he sought. As more and more time passed with the Arkenstone remaining hidden from his sight, a knot of anger twisted in his chest, until he raked through the gold piled atop glittering gold, hands claws. Had he not done enough? Suffered enough sorrows and been denied enough in the hardscrabble years following Erebor's loss? Why then, after he'd at last reclaimed his grandfather's halls, was this affirmation of his victory and right to rule withheld from him?

Balin had tried once to draw him away from his increasingly feverish search; Thorin, to his shame, could not recall what he'd said, except that it'd been undeservingly harsh, accusing. More than once, he caught Bilbo standing on a ledge or staircase above, watching him with dark eyes, face tense and one hand in his pocket, the other fisted at his side. _Was that when I lost his trust?_ He'd felt abandoned by his company, though in truth they were at his side no matter their reservations, and convinced himself that none but his closest kin, his heirs, could understand.

Yet when Fíli and a healed Kíli finally arrived, Bofur, Óin, and two armies at their heels, barely had the joyous greetings been exchanged before Thorin found himself at odds with them both. While they would never be so disrespectful as to flout their king's commands, it was clear that their wills were matched against their uncle's.

Fíli implored Thorin to hear Bard out, that the honor of a man who'd open his home—for no other reason than that Kíli was hurt, when everybody else had turned them away—to the companions of one he'd recently and publicly quarreled with could be trusted. But Thorin knew his nephew well, and what he saw in Fíli's eyes, so like Frerin's, was guilt. Fíli's own acute sense of honor would demand repayment of the debt he felt was owed Bard. For the orcs they'd led unwittingly to his children, for his slaying of Smaug, and for his later warning that they leave before the Master of Laketown roused sentiment against them. Thorin, however, denied that a few good deeds, the chiefest of which was as much self-serving as it was selfless, excused the affront of leading an army to another's home with the intent of thievery.

Worse was Kíli. Who dared suggest that the Elves might have come arrayed for war on behalf of their allies, the Men of Esgaroth, rather than seeing them for the opportunistic robbers they were, whose sole aim was to loot a treasure they had no claim to. "They are not without compassion, Uncle," Kíli had said quietly, and Thorin could not help but suspect that the redheaded she-Elf who saved Kíli's life had also bewitched him, ensnared with her enchantments his youthful spirit that loved all things seemingly fair and brave. Even if Thorin had been able to believe that one singular Elf could shed the disdain of her race to care for a mortal, much less a Dwarf, it was Thranduil who marched on their gates, and the Elvenking's heart was as ice, as hard and gleaming cold as the white gems he so coveted. He would not hesitate to use the plight of the Men to win his prize, exploiting Thorin's mercy and generosity.

Kíli had listened as Thorin instructed him on the realities of their situation, a stubborn set to his jaw, then said, "So you would deny the Lakemen aid until they come to us as beggars? You once told us of how the Elves refused our people succor when we were homeless and starving, yet you would be no better should you turn from those in need now because, having lost much, they would not sacrifice their pride, too." His voice had risen, his eyes flashing with the temper that was so like Thorin's own, which stirred in response. "And why should they? When, where _we_ have failed and failed again, _they_ killed the dragon that would've come back to kill _you!_"

Thorin's expression must have been terrible in his wrath, sudden as a spring storm, for Kíli almost quailed, before tipping his chin up, defiant. Now, the memory made Thorin queasy, wishing he could hide his face until he was alone again but knowing he hadn't the strength, his arm trembling. Letting his hand fall back down onto the blankets, he stared at his open palm. He did not like to think that he was the type who'd strike his kin in anger, but he'd been gripped then by a convulsion of emotion such as he'd never felt except in the heat of battle, his blood boiling at a threat to what was his. Fíli had stepped between Thorin and Kíli, head bowed.

"Forgive my brother his hasty words, Uncle," he'd said. "We made all speed to reach you with this news, and he is overtired, weak still from his sickness." Kíli swallowed and looked away, teeth gritted, but did not protest. At Thorin's nod, Fíli continued, "We shall, as ever, abide by your will in this and all matters of state." There was a distance in Fíli's voice, a polite deference that named Thorin _king_ and a stranger.

_Amends_, he thought. _I must make amends._ What had become of his vow, sworn as he watched, helpless, Thrór pay more mind to his treasure than to his kingdom, not to fall prey to the same madness? Yet here he was, in his grandfather's place, Fíli and Kíli cast in his, though bolder than he ever was. His stomach lurched again. He still didn't know if Fíli and Kíli were well. _If they lived..._ No, he refused to believe his sister-sons dead. He would see Fíli's bright hair at the tent entrance one morning, Kíli at his brother's side, to wake him with twin grins of delight, their youth tempered but untarnished. The half-remembered sound of Ori crying softly at his bedside echoed in his ears, mocking.

"—deal your treasure well, honoring all contracts, and that the Dwarves of the Iron Hills will receive weregild for their blood, reward for their fealty." Thorin blinked; Balin had been advising him on the appeasement of Dáin's followers, his face expectant, as Thorin wandered lost in the past. _I have failed enough in my duty._ He set aside his worries for Fíli and Kíli with a wrench, their absence like a missing limb, and forced himself to consider what he knew of the Iron Hills.

"Many of those who fled Erebor settled in the Iron Hills," he said slowly, "and are welcome to return or stay as they wish. I will not refuse the service of any Dwarf who seeks to restore the Mountain to its former glory, and the lords of the Iron Hills can expect seats on my council, as befits their rank and our kinship." Dáin's political skill, which had always been subtler and lighter in touch than Thorin's, was going to be much missed in the days to come. "Though... I do not think such rich deposits of ore should be abandoned. The steelsmiths of the Iron Hills are without equal, and I would see both realms attain the prosperity of old, before the shadow of the dragon darkened the Mountain's slopes, when the Dwarves of Erebor and markets of Dale were ever glad to have the works of Grór's people."

Balin nodded his approval, and Thorin let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "I'll send a raven at once," said Balin. They'd been fortunate to find the birds still roosting in the guardpost on the heights of Ravenhill. Despite the great age of some of the ravens—one large bird in particular was bald and partially blind, flapping ponderously among the rocks—they'd proved reliable messengers to the Iron Hills, bringing Dáin in the nick of time.

For the barest moment, Balin hesitated, eyes sliding away from Thorin. "There are a few other matters that I fear cannot wait—" As if to make up for his lapse, Balin's tone was brisk and no-nonsense when he resumed, but Thorin did not think him surprised so much as resigned when he stopped Balin mid-sentence with a raised hand.

He frowned at Balin's pinched look. Stubborn and independent-minded as Dwarves were on the whole—heads as hard as the stone of their halls, according to some—loyalty to family and clan was the foundation of their culture, wound through their very bones and sinews from birth. While internecine power struggles marred the annals of Elves and Men, that was not the way of the Dwarves. To be King of Durin's Folk was to be as a father to all Durin's descendants, the eldest brother of seven, and whatever squabbles might arise between siblings or parent and child, there could be no open strife between kin, for that was the worst of wars. On this, every Dwarf agreed. _Even Grandfather._

"We have bled for you and will again," Dáin had said to him before they parted where Durin the Deathless first marveled at the stars mirrored in the waters of the Kheled-zâram. And there had been nothing grudging in his cousin's voice nor in the strong clasp of Dáin's hand on his arm. No tinge of accusation, as in the farewells of the Dwarves from the clans farther east, bitter for their losses. How grateful he was then for Dáin's grounding presence! The name Oakenshield settling like a mantle about his shoulders, heavy with the gazes of those who saw upon his head his grandfather's crown, and grief lodged in his chest, sharp and tearing, he'd found that he could breathe easier in the knowledge that this most influential of his kin, of the line to which the kingship would pass should Thrór's fail, still stood stalwart beside Durin's heir despite the ills that had befallen them.

_And so he spoke truly_, Thorin thought with a pang. It was difficult to credit that Dwarves sworn to Dáin would show so little regard for how his cousin felt in life, causing trouble beyond grumbling. _For what else could give Balin such anxiety?_ Veteran of countless hundreds of council room battles, some of which had near ended with an ax embedded in the table or a fellow councilor's thick skull, Balin was acting skittish as a lad upon the eve of his first skirmish, restless fingers smoothing one tail of his beard, then the other. "Have you another suggestion?" Thorin asked mildly.

"I..." Balin swallowed, head bowing as if the weight was suddenly too much for his neck. "There is another way to ease tensions, but..." His words were halting, choked with an emotion that Thorin feared to name. This was more personal than ensuring good relations with the Dwarves of the Iron Hills, and part of Thorin shied at the realization, an icy hand squeezing his heart. _I am not my father._ After a pause that stretched like a fraying rope between them, neither willing to let go, Balin said weakly, "It is... a delicate matter that can wait for a later time." He struggled to meet Thorin's eyes, and when he did, it was with a silent plea.

Thorin's throat was dry, and his tongue felt swollen, stuck to the roof of his mouth. He could press Balin for answers, he knew, as he'd meant to with Ori and with Dwalin, but... He was not ready. "Very well, Balin." Not ready to learn that... He ruthlessly cut the thought off.

Immediately, there was a relief of pressure in his chest, but it only left him sickened, wanting to retch as the growing hiss in his ears—_coward, you coward_—slithered around his neck like a noose, tightening. "What more is there to see to?" he demanded, hating how desperate he sounded. Balin didn't flinch at his clipped tone, merely nodding and continuing, his mask of composure fixed firmly back in place.

"The Arkenstone"—something in Thorin shivered at the name, the music in it calling to him despite everything—"is still in Bard's possession, and he would return it to you before he leaves for Laketown on the morrow." Longing punched him hard in the gut, driving the breath from him. Though he was dimly aware of Balin watching him closely, the glow of the Arkenstone, the Heart of the Mountain, was blinding in his mind's eye, streaming white through his fingers and limned in flickering arcs of color, rainbows trapped in crystal. He tensed. His hands burned with the phantom sensation of gold coins sliding clinking over his skin, cold metal warming at his touch, and a furious panic clawed at his insides, crying _where, where is it_.

But a voice sought him out in the dark beneath the Mountain, where all that shone was gold. _"Thorin!"_ It was Bilbo. He looked at Thorin with beseeching eyes, his hair whipped into tangles by a gust of wind. _"Thorin, I... did not mean, _want_ to betray you, but... But you are not yourself! Would you have us and your, your cousin, when he gets here, die for a, a _rock_ that's not needed anymore?"_ Why was Bilbo backing away from him? _"The dragon is dead! The Mountain is yours! You..."_ Bilbo, with his clever mind and his courageous heart, large enough to hold thirteen Dwarves, was not made to sound so small, no matter his slight frame. _"You have a _home_ again, Thorin, and your family, maybe friends, if you would just bend a little. Isn't that worth all the treasure in Erebor?"_ The question was a wavering one, uncertain. And Thorin saw his own hands, fingers hooked into talons, reach for Bilbo and the bared curve of his neck, outlined against the sky.

His eyes snapped open at the brush of a hand against his shoulder. "Thorin," Balin said gently, "do you need to rest?" He was panting harshly, a thin film of sweat cooling on his brow; he shivered. Balin fretted beside him, but the memory of Bilbo struggling in his grasp as Thorin dragged him to the edge of the ramparts, intending to cast him down the sheer face of the Mountain to join the other thieves at the gates, was nearer still. _I would've smiled to hear him scream._ Would've been glad to see Bard's expression of shock and the Elvenking's when that body, the size of a child's, landed at their feet in a crumple of broken bones. "We can—"

"_No._" Had he been stronger, his guilt and shame not crushing him like a vise, he would've shouted his denial. "No, we do this _now_." His nails dug into the palms of his clenched hands; Thorin hoped they cut deep. Bloody crescents that might scar into reminders of what he deserved.

The Arkenstone had been a beacon in the yawning vastness of the first King Under the Mountain's great hall, drawing every eye to it and the throne upon which it spilled its light most brightly, but Bilbo was right. Possession of a rock, though the finest, rarest jewel ever mined from the earth, did not make one fit to wear a crown. Honor, compassion, fairness of judgment and dedication to duty, love enough not to risk people and kingdom for the cause of petty pride—such were the marks of a ruler whose rule was wise and just. When had his grandfather forgotten that? _And when did I?_

Exhaustion was beginning to weigh down his limbs, pain stabbing behind his eyes. Perhaps, he thought, mirthlessly, his head would burst like an overripe tomato, sparing him this scouring of his sins. Balin's look of concern had not diminished; he needed to regain control of himself. "Bard is in camp?" Thorin asked, seeking a distraction and not a little surprised. He did not take Bard for a man who'd send the soldiers under his command to chase after orcs and goblins without him. There was but one possibility in Thorin's mind. "How badly was he injured?"

While Balin stared at him in a pointed statement of who else had required the services of the healers, he did not refuse Thorin an answer, for which he was grateful. He'd rather hear of Bard's troubles than Bilbo's wet gasp as the soft flesh of his belly parted on the edge of Thorin's sword, Thorin pulling him close, his labored breathing a stutter in Thorin's ear, to pluck the Arkenstone from his pocket. _A lie. I did not..._ The butchered meat that slid from his blade was not worth even a last glance; he had eyes only for the Arkenstone, _oh_, the Arkenstone, red and slippery in his hands, _finally_. "Tell me of Bard," he said hoarsely, swallowing bile.

Bard had indeed been wounded, but not badly enough, it seemed, for his enforced inactivity to sit well. A cleanly broken arm and bruised ribs had kept him from joining the pursuit; the morning after the battle, he could not don his coat without blanching, unable to hide how much he hurt. The Elvenking himself drugged the man into insensibility, or so Balin heard, then set an Elven guard on him, with strict instructions not to let him travel farther than Dale and certainly not to Laketown, as he wished to when he woke, angry and agitated.

"He was... insistent that he had to return to his children," said Balin, gaze dropping to his knees, where his hands curled loosely. Thorin wondered whether he, too, recalled the high, sweet voice of the girl who'd welcomed them into Bard's home, cramped and roughly built but warm, by asking if they would bring her family luck. "Not until he spoke with Thranduil's couriers did he consent to rest."

_Dragonfire and ruin._ Thorin kneaded the ridge of his nose. _That is all I've brought the Men of the Lake._ He'd excused his dismissal of Bard's claims as the only response a king could give to men who would steal by force of arms what should be asked for. Yet would he have honored his promise of gold enough to rebuild Esgaroth ten times over had the Elves retreated, the Men laid down their weapons? He did not know...

Thorin scoffed. _I was reluctant to pay the cost of a few boats, weapons, and ill-fitting clothes._ Nor could he blame Bard for his lack of trust, for Kíli was right, and Thorin had spit on Thranduil's word after the Elves showed themselves indifferent to his people's suffering. The same callousness he'd shown the Lakemen, consumed by his search for the Arkenstone, in the week of silence following Smaug's death. _And..._ The Elvenking did not wake the beast and point it towards its unsuspecting victims, filled with ire. Thorin closed his eyes, wincing, hand rubbing weakly over his face. Why had he tried to deny all responsibility for the failure of his plans? What had he been _thinking?_

Short were the lives of Men and their vision limited, that of poor men even more so, easily swayed by sweet talk in the present but blind to the inevitabilities of the future. Smaug was cruel and capricious, bowing to no master, except perhaps his own greed. Laketown had always been at the mercy of a monster notorious for having none, whether the attack came in a year or generations later. _But it was I who chose _these_ people, in _this_ time to bear Smaug's wrath._

Was there not a single deed to his name in the fortnight before the battle that was _right_, wholly and truly? He could not blame all on the dragon sickness either, for he had been himself, just the worst parts, stripped of nobility; Bilbo was wrong about that.

"Let him keep that cursed stone." The words were as much a shock to Thorin as they were to Balin, interrupting an account of Bard's walking surveys of Dale, shadowed by a watchful Elf. But the longer Thorin considered the idea, the more he felt it to be _right_. "May it bring him better fortune than me and mine."

What good had the Arkenstone done Thrór, stoking his desire for gold until pride became arrogance? _Or me?_ King and kingdom both would be the stronger without the delusion that whoever held a _rock_, treacherous for all its beauty and allure, was somehow ordained to rule and beyond question. It would be hard to win the acceptance of his people for this, though Erebor's wealth was his to divide, the Arkenstone being no exception. Bard could, however, be convinced quicker than any Dwarf to rid everyone of the ill-fated jewel, Thorin judged, willing as he'd been to exchange it for practical gold and silver.

Balin had stilled. He cleared his throat and, expression neutral, said carefully, "Do you not intend to honor your bargain with Bard?" For a moment, Thorin was confused. Then he groaned, slumping tiredly. He'd forgotten that not only had Bard asked for a ransom but that he had agreed to pay it. For the Arkenstone's return. A fourteenth of the dragon's hoard, excluding gems, he remembered. Bilbo's contracted share of the quest's profits.

"No, I did not mean..." Suddenly, Thorin laughed, low and bitter, at this irony. When he had wanted nothing in the world so keenly as the Arkenstone, it eluded him, remaining tauntingly out of his reach in the hands of others, but now that he'd gladly see it lost to some far corner of Rhûn or the depths of the sea, events were conspiring to force it into his possession. He could not even say that this farce was unexpected; his life of late had seemed one endless series of such humbling lessons.

"Bard shall have his due," Thorin finally said, voice a rasp. _And more_, he thought, for it'd been out of spite alone that he'd denied Bard any of the innumerable gems scattered amidst the gold and silver, often wrought into fine jewelry, arms and armor, tableware. "Have the gold sorted to send to Laketown. As much as Bard requires, though"—Thorin winced again; the survivors of Smaug's attack would be lucky to have food and shelter enough to stave off death this winter—"offer to him the continued use of Erebor's vaults to keep safe his share of the treasure. The Arkenstone..." He had not the will to fight anymore. "I would be pleased to receive it from him," he lied, defeated.

"I'll let Bard know," said Balin, eyes worried as he searched Thorin's face. "Now, I think it would be best for you to rest until supper." Balin had the air of one who'd come to a difficult decision and was hurrying to see it through before he could change his mind. "We can speak again later." He studiously avoided Thorin's gaze as he made to rise from his seat.

"Balin." He was not ready. But neither did Thorin want to cling to his hopes any longer. They were a thin comfort, _false_, dread coiling in the pit of his stomach like a serpent waiting to strike. "Tell me of the Company." Balin sighed, almost inaudibly, the frown lines at the corners of his mouth deepening. In the sag of his shoulders, the stiffness of his spine, Thorin read reluctance... and grief—a bottomless well of it. "If the news is ill," he said, the words lodging in his throat, "I would rather hear it sooner than later."

He felt brittle as hardened steel left in the cold, invisible fractures webbing his skin, but he straightened and firmed his expression into one of grim resolve. Sheer bravado, he knew, weakness thrumming through his veins, and it did not fool Balin. With a silent curse at being bedridden—he would not be able to catch Balin by the arm or follow should he choose to flee—Thorin surrendered what little pride remained to him and begged. "Balin, _please_." Looking stricken and unutterably weary, Balin nodded.

At first, the news was good. Bofur, Óin and Glóin, Dori, Nori, and Ori—Balin confirmed that they all lived and were well, healing in Ori's case from a broken ankle. Óin had taken charge of the wounded, consulting closely with the Elven healers who stayed when Thranduil marched with most of his strength, and Glóin was managing the sorting of the treasure, which had started the very next day after the battle in anticipation of Thorin honoring his bargain with Bard. No Dwarf spent more than a few hours at a time with the gold, however, Balin assured him, not even Glóin.

Everybody was arranged into shifts instead that rotated daily between repair work on the Mountain's stone halls, supply and salvage, kitchen duties, guard patrols, and burial details. Bombur ruled meal preparations with an iron ladle, by the accounts of his cowed helpers, Bifur and Bofur aiding and abetting his culinary reign of terror, when they weren't hauling stone to erect the new support columns in the entrance hall. Dori could frequently be found caring for Óin's patients, not least because Ori was among them, but was just as often at Nori's side as he cleared and appraised the contents of Erebor's countless storage rooms, marked and hidden. And Dwalin's sadistic glee at startling inattentive sentries at their posts was fast becoming legend, he and Dáin's captains determined to keep the camp in readiness for attack by the goblin stragglers reported to have fled east.

"Bilbo is well, running messages for me," Balin said, and Thorin breathed a sigh of relief, a knot under his sternum loosening. "He was missing on the battlefield for half a day before one of the Men found him. And he got a bit knocked about on the head." When Thorin tensed in alarm, seeing curls of hair red with blood, Balin added hastily, "Which is by now _quite_ healed, upon the word of Óin, Gandalf, _and_ the Elves."

_Has he asked after me? Been to see me?_ The questions were on the tip of his tongue; Thorin bit down on them. Bilbo would be well within his rights to demand that Thorin never speak to him again, never again come into his sight. He closed his eyes—they were stinging—and tried to reconcile himself to the loss of a friendship that, though short and troubled, much of it his own doing, had been alight with the fragile promise of something good and lasting.

_"I do believe the worst is behind us."_ That dawn upon the Carrock had been lovelier than any in more years than Thorin cared to count. Forgotten was the pain of his wounds, Azog's hated face, sneering at him as trees flamed around them like torches in the night, when the sunrise touched the Lonely Mountain's peak with rosy fingers. They descended the rocks, singing, the blue dome of the sky brightening above them and hope high in their hearts, and Bilbo was close by his side then, a shy smile tucked into the corners of his mouth, the cheer of the Company, even Gandalf's grumbling, enfolding them. But there were shadows waiting for them at the foot of the mountains, a chill mist hanging in the air, and the darkness of Mirkwood, the waters of Long Lake, and finally the echoing halls of Erebor had been colder still, cold as gold sliding over his skin.

"Thorin." The sound of his name was jarring despite Balin's gentle tone. "Bilbo sits with you every night, after Óin's tonic has put you to sleep. We usually have to come here to wake him in the mornings." Humbled anew, Thorin stared blinking at the blankets, imagining Bilbo's hand, soft except for tentative calluses from Sting, curled atop them next to his. "He's afraid you haven't forgiven him for the Arkenstone." Balin's voice was filled with affection and exasperation, as was the gaze he turned on Thorin as Thorin sat stunned into speechlessness. _How could Bilbo think that, when I nearly killed him in my madness?_

"It is _I_ who must ask _his_ forgiveness," said Thorin. He glanced uncertainly at Balin, his heart a trapped moth in his throat. "Will he see me? To talk?" If Bilbo refused to allow him to make amends... He didn't know what he would do.

"Aye, I reckon he will." Balin's smile was small but reassuring, and the fluttering settled in his chest as if he'd caught the moth in his cupped hands, delicate wings a tickle against his palms. _I can take back my words and deeds at the gates._ Though their friendship may be nothing more than memory, he and Bilbo could part in kindness, and for that Thorin was grateful.

For a while, there was silence, unbroken except for the faint noises of camp beyond the tent. Thorin was no fool, no matter how badly he'd acted one; he hadn't failed to note whose names Balin had not mentioned. Perhaps one or the other was grievously wounded and had yet to wake, the hopes of recovery dwindling with every passing day. Perhaps both had been maimed, lost limbs or senses or wits. _Perhaps..._

But, no, the hollowness that grew in him as he again saw sorrow's hand heavy upon Balin told him otherwise. "What of Fíli? Kíli?" He managed to keep his voice level until the end, when Balin looked away, swallowing a choked sob, as clear an answer as anything he could've said.

Fíli was dead. Kíli was dead.

And Thorin felt nothing. Distantly, he heard how his breathing hitched, the pounding tempo of his heart erratic. It grated at his ears like a dull file across the pitted bone of his skull, and he wished he could be rid of the sound. The cot he lay on, nestled in a cocoon of bedding, was too warm and too soft, the light that seeped through the tent's canvas walls too bright, blurring the world until there was not a sharp edge anywhere to match that of the knife carving him open from throat to navel. He felt _nothing_.

Deep beneath the Mountain, there were chambers where the walls, floor, and even ceiling were inlaid with patterned bands of gold and truesilver, scenes of the world and the storied history of the Dwarves graven on the panels between by the finest stonemasons of the kingdom. Gems would flash by torchlight, tens of thousands of mirrors, each no larger than the head of a pin, but it was usually dark and quiet. Thorin wanted to stretch out on his back upon one of those smooth floors and just... _sleep_. Until his body was as cold as it was numb.

It'd been summer still when they left the Blue Mountains, the trees adorned in their richest green and autumn no more than a teasing nip in the air before each day dawned hotter than the last. Thorin would turn north on the Greenway to attend a gathering of their kin, but he and his sister-sons planned to journey together until Bree, where they expected to meet Gandalf and the rest of the Company, scattered on errands.

Kíli had been struggling to contain his excitement, Thorin remembered, at setting out on what he was sure would be the grandest adventure of his young life; he'd never been farther east than Dunland in the south, and the horror of the dragon paled in comparison to the prospect of seeing with his own eyes the Lonely Mountain of his childhood tales, its splendid halls and immense wealth. Fíli clearly felt that the momentous occasion deserved solemnity but found his brother's enthusiasm hard to resist and, before long, Thorin was beginning to dread the many leagues to Bree.

Charming and beautiful in her best clothes, their mother smiled and laughed at their antics, a sparkling net in her dark hair. As the hour came to part, she sternly commanded them to be mindful of their uncle's orders and to wear their cloaks in rain—with the hood up, Kíli—to sit close to the fire, eat well and sleep well, not let the other engage in any foolishness... before drawing each of her sons into a hug that seemed as if it didn't want to let them go.

To Thorin, she had given only her blessing, the press of her lips on the crown of his bowed head light but lingering, and a wish for the success of his quest. When he made to promise her that he would deliver her sons to her safe, she hushed him, still smiling, and deftly put him on the road, Fíli and Kíli waiting impatiently for him to join them as the sun climbed higher in the cloudless sky.

"Dís..." When he turned back, however, as his feet took him out of view over the crest of a hill, he'd caught the slump in her shoulders as she walked slowly home, her lone figure small against the looming mass of the mountains. "Has word been sent?"

He hardly recognized his own voice. Though unchanged in pitch, it had been leeched of all color, pulled and twisted into a thin thread of sound that Thorin could only be glad didn't tremble as his hands were. Frowning at his traitorous fingers, he spread his palms flat on the tense muscle of his thighs, brittle bone beneath, until the twitching urge to claw at his hair, at his face passed.

Balin looked at him like Thorin was a wounded animal, worry warring with pity in his eyes and grief a shroud over both. He hesitated, then said quietly, "Thorin—"

"Has word been sent to my sister?" Thorin cut him off, tone biting. He did not want, _deserve_, anyone's sympathy. He, who had come home once before without father and brother, had now cost Dís her sons, too, and was _not worthy_, not a fit object for any feeling but her anger. Something in him shifted at the thought, a muscle tearing loose from tendons and bone, maybe, or a ripped vein gushing with every beat of his heart, draining him and filling him at the same time with blood, thick and choking—_no_, he was _not_ hurt. He must remember that.

"No..." Balin whispered, shaking his head. "No, the ravens can't..." He didn't finish, wilting under Thorin's flinty stare. Balin meant well, Thorin knew, probably hoping to soften the blow in that deceptive way all good diplomats had of diverting the mind with meaningless pleasantries. But the world had cracked into pieces at his feet, and there was no sense in charades anymore. Not when he had seen to the rotten core of things, victory shorn of joy.

"Dwalin will leave before the snows to escort Lady Dís to Erebor in the spring," Balin finally said, speech smooth but eyes averted, "and Glóin and Bombur with him to fetch their families." He glanced at Thorin, then away again, shoulders rounding like rock beaten by water. "We thought... you might wish to send with Dwalin a letter or..."

"Yes..." Thorin mumbled, tongue swollen in his mouth. "A letter..." Ink bleeding black across yellowed parchment—Thorin could not envision words capable of containing this loss, his sister's fingers tracing the dried lines of the runes. _I should ask how..._ Yet he couldn't bring himself to supplant his last memories of Fíli and Kíli as they'd been, strong of limb and strong of heart, clad as the princes they were in gilded mail.

Pride had bloomed fierce in his breast as they filed past him to war, fearless, Fíli in the lead, Kíli half a step behind, and again in the tumult of the fighting when they alone of the Company gave thought to the formations of their erstwhile besiegers, the Elves and Men, now allies. Though the battle was going ill then, their enemies swarming in an endless dark sea, he could see glimpses of a shining future.

Fíli would be a better, greater king than he, possessed of a more even temper; his natural talent for statecraft already outstripped Thorin's, which had so often dismayed his tutors at Fíli's age. And Kíli would be Fíli's loyal right hand, as Frerin might have been his, a daring general, recklessness tempered by experience, and a charismatic adviser with Dís's effortless social graces. _I should not have let them stray from my side._ Durin's heirs they were, and they had died hard and too young.

"I'll have Nori..." Balin's voice drifted to him as if he were being hailed from a far distant shore veiled in mist, fading in and out. He would never be able to watch Fíli and Kíli learn the love of families of their own, he realized—sons and daughters to hold in their arms, nephews and nieces to smilingly spoil. Surely, they had been kissed at least? By a pretty lass they were sweet on or a handsome lad, bold as brass and blushing shy? Thorin didn't know and could not ever ask. "Thorin—" Balin again, pleading.

"If there is nothing else to see to, Balin," said Thorin, "I would now like to rest." He sounded almost normal but felt... nothing. He'd been hollowed out.

"Thorin—" Balin's expression was pained, one hand half extended towards Thorin's shoulder, silently begging permission to touch, comfort. _He need not treat me like glass._ And Thorin found that there was yet anger in him. It swelled up sudden as an avalanche in the mountains, a thundering wall of blind rage.

"_Leave me_," he hissed and looked on, unmoved, as Balin paled until his skin was the color of his beard, his eyes widening. Then Thorin stared fixedly at his hands, clenched and shaking in his lap. Finally, without another word, Balin left. _Good_, thought Thorin, even as the first tendrils of shame wrapped tight about his heart.

How long he sat there afterwards, alone and thinking of nothing, staring at nothing, he didn't know. He was startled by the rattle of a tray being placed on the ground, blinking at the gloom inside the tent. When had night fallen? With a rasping strike of a match—Thorin turned his head at the noise—Bombur lit the candles at his bedside, before arranging carefully across his lap a small table, upon which was a steaming tray of food, bowl, plate, and spoon neatly laid. Supper delivered, Bombur seemed to hesitate, tugging at the blankets where Thorin had rucked them up—his traitorous hands, scrabbling for some purchase—until Thorin was once more ensconced in a warm, soft cocoon. Another hesitation, but whatever it was Bombur wanted to say, he apparently decided otherwise, retreating as quietly as he'd come, entire body drooping.

Staring now at his supper, Thorin wondered whether he'd ever stop feeling ashamed. Accompanying the expected broth, the same that Dwalin had brought, was a pastry pie, crust baked to golden, flaky perfection. Someone had cut it into equal-sized chunks fit to his spoon, revealing the filling of finely ground meat, browned but still juicy, and minced vegetables. This was surely the work of a whole afternoon and with game scarcer as winter deepened, made to please him. _I've been an ungrateful churl._

"Bombur," he said, Bombur pausing at the tent entrance, face nervous and questioning, "it is good to see you well." Thorin cleared his throat, his voice a stiff croak from disuse, nodding at the tray before him. "Thank you. The meal looks wonderful."

Was that enough? Or had he presumed too much? His courtesies were not so refined as Balin's—_I must make amends_—but neither could he recall being this clumsy with his words, ungainly as a newborn colt and unbalanced, since he was younger than... He closed his eyes and inhaled, exhaled, one slow breath at a time.

"Thank me by eating it," Bombur said gently, and when Thorin opened his eyes, he was alone again. Determinedly, he ate, spooning mouthfuls of soup and pastry with mechanical efficiency until both bowl and plate stood empty, though he tasted nothing, all the food turned to dust on his tongue. _This meal was wasted on me_, he thought bitterly, lips twisting in loathing at this further proof that he deserved no kindness.

An hour, maybe two, later—time passed strangely, lagging one moment, slipping through his fingers the next—Thorin had another visitor. His eyes played a trick on him at first but, no, the jutting ridge of hair was taller, spikier, lighter in color than Dwalin's, which had long been shaved clean. _After Azanulbizar_, Thorin remembered. _But Dori and Ori are well..._ He had seen Ori with his own eyes, heard Dori, and Balin would deflect but not lie to him. "Nori," he said, inexplicably afraid, "your hair...?"

Nori's worried expression was overtaken by one of surprise and, to Thorin's relief, he smiled, tentative and a bit sheepish. "Ah, well," he said, rubbing a hand over his shorn skin, "I almost lost my head to a lucky goblin. Didn't see much point in keeping the one side when the other had to be cut down near to nothing..." He shrugged, affectedly casual.

"It suits you," Thorin said, trying to smile in return, though he failed in this, too, judging by how Nori's face set into rigid lines. _Better that we not pretend all is well._ "Balin said that... you'd have pen and parchment for me?" He was not certain that had, in fact, been what Balin instructed, but Nori nodded and laid at Thorin's side on the cot a stack of paper, quill and inkpot that Thorin hadn't noticed he'd been carrying.

With a small noise of satisfaction, Nori picked up the tray with its empty bowl and plate. Scrutinizing the tray with undue attention and his fingers fidgeting at its edges, he said, "I know nothing can make it right, _easier_, but..." He swallowed and trailed off. "I'll just see this back to the kitchens," he finally muttered, clearly intending to scuttle out of the tent without enlightening Thorin as to what he meant. Then Thorin glanced down at the parchment Nori had brought him.

_How...?_ The top sheets were of the fine vellum, white and luminous, used for royal edicts and other writings of importance; the hammer, anvil, and seven-starred crown was framed in an elaborate seal of darkest blue at the head of each page. His eyes burned as he thumbed the smooth, crisp paper, familiar to the touch from lazy afternoons spent in the king's private study when Frerin and Dís were still toddling, too little to peer over the ledge of Grandfather's desk.

Thrór had been an indulgent minder, allowing them to sit in his lap, curious fingers buried in his beard, as he read correspondence. His hands were big and warm, sure, around Thorin's as he taught Thorin how to fold piece after piece of thin, beautiful vellum into wondrous shapes—birds and beasts, flowers, stars and angular mysteries to draw gap-toothed grins from Frerin, giggles from Dís. This news would be ugly wrought in gold and _mithril_, studded with a hundred precious stones, but...

"My thanks, Nori," said Thorin, voice thick. "Dís will appreciate this... kindness." Nori visibly relaxed, tense shoulders sagging in relief and a tightness around his eyes, his mouth easing.

After Nori took his leave for the night with a nod, Thorin spread the parchment across the small table Bombur had brought, vellum pushed carefully into one corner so he could first compose his thoughts on paper of poorer quality. But he found himself staring uselessly at his hands instead.

What good would his words of apology and condolence do? They could not change the past nor serve as a ward against mistakes in the future, should he again fall to madness. "You are not making a very splendid figure as King Under the Mountain," Gandalf had said, tone aggrieved, at the gates. Bilbo was climbing down to join him, siding with Bard and Thranduil, head bowed as his bare hands and feet scraped across the rocks. Thorin had been furious then. _He_ was the one who'd been betrayed by false friends, besieged by thieves extorting the treasures of his people from him at swordpoint. Fate, however, had judged him to be in the wrong and exacted a punishment that...

Rubbing a weak hand over his face, Thorin fought the hitch in his breath, the back of his throat wet. He steeled himself, hollowness giving way to grim resolve, reached for the pen and, dipping it in ink, began writing. _I, Thorin son of Thráin, son of Thrór, King Under the Mountain, hereby..._

**· · ·**

He woke late the next day, ink staining his aching fingers and candles burnt down to stubs. Thorin cast a critical eye over the two letters he'd written: The second, to Dís, was spare of words and inadequate, but Thorin folded it with unsteady hands regardless to await a seal. The first, lengthier by far, was for Balin and awaited his approval; reading it was a queer comfort, a weight lifting from his shoulders that he'd grown so accustomed to it'd long become a part of him. He did not know who he would be without it. _But this is right._ And what might have been a pang of regret was swept away like snow blown into a cold, blank expanse of white by the wind.

When Bombur eventually came with the midday meal—more soup and a freshly baked roll, spread with a smidgen of blackberry jam—Thorin asked for Balin to attend him as soon as possible. Still, it was not until after Thorin had finished eating, his tray and dishes cleared briskly by Dori, already carrying a stack from his rounds of the camp, that Balin ducked into the tent.

Food sitting heavy in his stomach, an indigestible lump—it'd stuck to the roof of his mouth like wet ash as he forced himself to eat—Thorin watched unblinkingly as Balin heated a spoonful of sealing wax over a candle. "You've letters to send?" said Balin, tone light and neutral, as if he didn't know exactly what letter Thorin had to send, with what news and to whom. Shame rose in him again as he noted the careful way Balin avoided meeting his gaze, eyes red from a sleepless night.

"Yes," Thorin said, handing over his letter to Dís. "And... I owe you an apology for yesterday, as well as for the other times I've been undeservedly short with you this past month." He swallowed, thinking of the harsh words he'd answered Balin's counsel with, mind fixed on the Arkenstone. "I can make no excuses for my behavior. Except to ask that you not hold my poor temper"—Thorin smiled bitterly at this understatement—"as a reflection of my esteem of you." He found it difficult to look at Balin, head wanting to bow so he could stare at his hands instead, his remaining letter framed between them on the writing table.

Balin deftly sealed Dís's letter, impressing the dark blue wax with a silver stamp, fitted to a handle of marble veined in gold, bearing the royal emblem—courtesy of Nori, Thorin guessed—after moistening the metal end with his breath. "There is nothing to forgive," he said easily. Tucking the letter into one of the inner pockets of his robes, Balin continued, "I'll see this to Dwalin." He gave Thorin no pause to attempt another apology. "Thranduil has returned and would speak to you before he departs for Mirkwood to stay. Gandalf and Beorn would also see that you are healing well before they depart with—"

Resigned now to the fact that Balin would not let him apologize properly, Thorin was still determined to make amends. "Balin," he said, "there is a matter that needs your attention first." At Balin's puzzled expression, Thorin handed him the other letter with a quiet, "Please read it and see that all is in order."

Affection warmed him when Balin drew from one voluminous sleeve a handheld jeweler's lens to study the text more closely. That had been a habit of Balin's since his youth, though Thorin knew his vision to be perfectly adequate to the task of reading even the finest print. How often he'd seen Balin pore over some contract or dry legal treatise, squinting through a like lens as if the mysteries of the world were contained within curls and loops of ink! _But maybe never again._ This time, he didn't fight the urge to lower his eyes, feeling suddenly numb.

"Long have I thought on my actions of late," he began, subdued, "and my failures as king. The wrongs I've done my loyal friends and followers, my... dearest kin." Thorin closed his eyes, hearing and hating the way his voice cracked. He pressed on, ruthlessly. "This is not a decision I've made lightly but in the interests of Erebor's future. Dáin's son is, by all accounts, a clever lad and stout of heart, growing to be much like his father, and I've appointed you his regent, which I do not believe will be contested, being your right as the eldest of Borin's line." Balin was ominously silent; Thorin dared not look at him.

"I shall winter in the Mountain, with your permission, so that I may greet my sister when she arrives. After..." He shook his head slowly, biting the inside of his cheek. "I... It is my hope to yet be of some service to our people. An invalid though I am at present, you know I can swing a sword. I could patrol our borders or, or help train our warriors." That would not be so bad, Thorin thought. To wield his blade in defense of his home and to teach young Dwarves to love the song of steel, Dwalin at his side, but... "No... No, my presence would only undermine your rule." And he'd realized that last night as he wrote. _I can delude myself no longer._ Erebor would be lost to him once more and the Blue Mountains, too, the Iron Hills and every realm Dwarves called theirs, the road stretching endlessly before him. "Then perhaps I can journey to Rhûn, to Rohan and Gondor or parts farther south as an envoy..."

"All seems to be in order," Balin said abruptly. Thorin nodded, exhaling shakily, and finally glanced at Balin, who had put away his lens and was folding the letter into neat thirds, face impassive. Then, as Thorin watched, flabbergasted, Balin ripped it in half and half again and again until it was little better than white confetti. That he sprinkled into a small heap atop the bedside table, brushing his hands clean of clinging pieces with an air of grim satisfaction.

"_Balin—!_" Thorin gritted his teeth. It had been tortuously hard to write that letter, though the other had been far harder, each stab of his pen upon the paper echoed by an ache in his chest. His eyes were stinging by the end, whether from exhaustion or the smoke of the candles he was unsure. He did not think he could do it a second time. "You—"

"Hear me, Thorin son of Thráin, son of Thrór," interrupted Balin in a tone that brooked no argument, a steely glint in his eye. "I did not trek a thousand miles through the wilds, brave trolls, goblins, orcs, wargs, spiders, and _a dragon_, fight a war and ally with _Elves_, Men, and Eagles to help you exile yourself out of misplaced guilt. And neither did the rest of the Company." Seeing Thorin's expression of startled wariness, Balin softened. "The best way to honor them, Thorin, is to honor the cause they died for and be the king you were always meant to be."

At that, Thorin let out a sharp bark of a laugh, face twisting in loathing. "What sort of king was I meant to be, Balin? I—"

"You fell to the gold sickness, aye. Like your grandfather before you." Balin said nothing that Thorin had not already thought of himself, but still the words burned his ears, a hot flush of shame crawling up his neck, somehow seeming more real now that another had spoken them for him to hear. "That there will be consequences you and I both know well. But...

"Thorin, this burden, this _responsibility_, is not yours alone to bear." Balin sighed heavily. "The Company has talked of this. If you failed us, so, too, did we fail you." Thorin opened his mouth to deny that, but Balin forestalled him with a raised hand. "The signs of Thrór's madness were not unknown to us, yet when the same shadow began to darken your mind, not one of us had the courage to tell you. Or even to challenge your decisions, except..." _Fíli, Kíli_, thought Thorin, and he knew from the bleak shine of Balin's eyes that he also remembered.

"Well," Balin continued with an effort, "_no more_." Resolve hard in his voice and his gaze pinning Thorin in place, unable to move, he said, "We have all of us—Dwalin and I, Óin and Glóin, Bifur, Dori, Bofur, Nori, Bombur, and even young Ori—sworn to guard you from this demon.

"If it seeks to prey upon your fears, we shall stand at your side and beat it back. If you are blinded by it, we shall not watch idly as you stumble but pull you up by the hand towards the light." Balin smiled at him, tone gentling and filled with such emotion that Thorin's breath caught. "And if ever you have cause to doubt your own strength in this battle, we shall lend you ours, whatever you may require of us, until you can find yours once again." He extended his hand to clasp Thorin's shoulder, and this time he did not balk, his unwavering grip a warm comfort. "This is not a foe that can defeat us or you, Thorin, now that we know its face."

"Balin, I..." Thorin swallowed convulsively, blinking away the tears that wanted to wet his skin. What had he done to deserve this devotion? He could spend a hundred lives of Men, as many ages as the Elves had, righting all the world's wrongs and still never be worthy of this faith, that forgave so readily but didn't diminish for it. "I... I'm afraid that—"

"Do you trust us?" Balin asked simply. "We are not the best nor brightest, I admit, but..." He'd felt that he understood then, what had brought this odd collection of Dwarves—merchants, miners, tinkerers, toymakers—to the cramped table of their fussy and reluctant host. "In this, can you believe in our word?" _Loyalty, honor, and a willing heart._

Perhaps they had not been the best when they first set out on the quest, but its trials had revealed their quality, like a rich vein of truesilver running hidden in the rock, diamonds in the rough. And there was only one answer that Thorin Oakenshield could give. "Yes."

"Then all will be well." With a final reassuring squeeze of Thorin's shoulder, Balin stood, patting down his robes. "Now, you have a busy afternoon ahead of you. The Elvenking first, Gandalf and Beorn. Tomorrow, we break camp and move the remaining wounded into Erebor's halls for the winter. Do you think you can walk with assistance?" Thorin nodded dumbly, thoughts sluggish as his mind turned the Company's care over and over, awed and humbled. Balin eyed him skeptically. "I suppose we'll cross that bridge when we come to it and not a moment sooner. As is our wont." The memory of Balin's wry smile stayed with Thorin long after he left.

His next visitor was not so welcome a sight. Thranduil looked much as Thorin had seen him prior to the battle, clad in dark armor silvered like the gleam of starlight on deep waters and flowing pale hair bound at his brow with a circlet of steel, though divested of his cloak. Thorin stiffened under that coolly appraising Elven gaze, all too aware of his own weakness, but Thranduil only said, "You seem much recovered from when last I saw you."

"I understand I have your healers to thank for that," Thorin said, matching Thranduil's polite tone despite how his jaw reflexively tightened at being in debt to one he could not help but consider more enemy still than friend. The Elvenking nodded graciously, as if receiving his due. His following words, however, surprised Thorin.

"No debt stands between us, King Under the Mountain. Have no fear." The glint in Thranduil's eye was slightly mocking, and Thorin's hackles rose. Before he could speak—probably something angry and insulting, he conceded—Thranduil continued, "Your kin has already seen the debt paid, a life for a life, and at a cost I would not have wished upon you. Were it not for your sister-son—Kíli, I believe he was called—my son Legolas would be counted among the dead." While unnerving with the weight of days unnumbered, there was a softness of feeling to Thranduil's unblinking stare now, an indefinable give in the sharp lines of his face, that Thorin had never imagined they could show.

"Bosom companions you and I shall never be," said Thranduil, as Thorin sat stunned, trying hard not to gape like a fool at this glimpse of a kinder, gentler Elvenking, blunt words aside. "Yet allies we can be, Erebor and the Woodland Realm at a peace as has not been known between our peoples since before the coming of the dragon."

_"They are not without compassion, Uncle."_ Whatever his nephew's motivations for saving the life of an Elven princeling at the expense of his own, Thorin refused to squander Kíli's sacrifice out of petty pride. _Would that I could tell him he was right..._ "Yes," he said, voice a little choked. "Let us be allies, as we were of old."

And for the second time in a month, Thorin found himself in the unforeseen position of being grateful to Thranduil. Who inclined his head in agreement before turning away to the tent entrance, leaving Thorin to swallow the grief Thranduil made no other acknowledgment of, in speech or deed. Thorin thought he might be grateful even for that.

When Thranduil returned, he carried a long, slender shape wrapped in wine-dark velvet, laid reverently across his open palms. A sword, Thorin realized with a jolt. "To seal this rapprochement, I restore now unto you what was wrongfully taken from you." Thranduil placed the sword on the cot at Thorin's side, flicking open the velvet to uncover the smooth curve of bright Elven steel. His hand twitched, and before Thorin could consider what ulterior motives the Elvenking might have in presenting Orcrist to him like this, his fingers had already closed around the hilt, the familiar ridges and carvings of dragonbone flush against his skin.

Loath though he'd been to recognize so at first, Orcrist was beautifully made. It was as finely crafted as the best Dwarven blades but with a lighter heft, the flare of its edge lending itself to arcing strikes, graceful and sweeping as a dance, if a lethal one. For years, Deathless, of his own forging, had served him faithfully. Yet after escaping the goblin tunnels, this very hilt molded to his grip as they cleaved, spinning, through their enemies, Thorin thought that no other weapon would ever feel as right in his hands, combat transformed into an art once more.

With an effort of will, Thorin forced himself to uncurl his fingers and release the hilt, resting his hand near on the velvet. "When last I held this blade, I was accused of being a thief," he observed, voice flat. The Elvenking raised an elegant eyebrow at his suspicion, not having missed his interest in the sword.

"The sons of Elrond joined us in pursuit of the goblins a few days past," said Thranduil, unfazed. Thorin frowned at this seeming digression. He was briefly introduced to the Lord of Rivendell's sons, as alike as two peas in a pod, during his stay in their father's house, but they'd quickly departed on some mysterious errand and he did not see them again. He could not recall their names, in truth, nor guess why they would trouble themselves with the treacherous mountain passes and tangled pathways of Mirkwood. _To kill goblins?_ They were a merry pair, jostling each other good-naturedly as they walked shoulder to shoulder away down the hall, a fond smile from their grave sire trailing them, and they'd reminded Thorin strongly of... _Of Fíli and Kíli_, he thought with a dull ache. _And me. Frerin and Thráin._

His confusion must have shown on his face because the Elvenking added, "There has not been an orc hunt within a hundred leagues of Imladris that they have failed to blood their swords on in four centuries. It is from them that we heard their father gifted you this blade, he whose kin forged and wielded it in Gondolin that was." Of Gondolin, Thorin knew only what legend told—a hidden city of tiered white stone that had stood against the Enemy in an earlier age, Minas Tirith its closest likeness still in the world—and he wondered who Elrond was that he could claim descent from the High Elves of that lost stronghold, bestowing its treasures upon whomever he pleased without contest.

_How easy it can be to neglect that even the youngest of your kind have been worn by lifetimes of strife and shaped by blood debts long forgotten._ "May it serve you well, Thorin Oakenshield," Thranduil finished, bowing his head almost imperceptibly and right hand over his heart in a stately Elven salute. His hand settling on Orcrist's hilt, Thorin nodded solemnly. _Let us be allies_, he repeated in silent vow to himself, as Thranduil made to leave. The Elvenking, however, paused at the tent entrance, straight back to Thorin.

"There is among the wounded a captain of mine, Tauriel," he said, not quite hesitant but slowly, "who is known to those of your company in Esgaroth when the dragon came. She grieves deeply for your sister-sons, the one she saved and the other she could not. I ask that you treat her kindly." And then, before Thorin could muster a reply to this, he was gone in a flash of sunlight on silvered armor and pale hair. The redheaded she-Elf—it must be her, but what had passed between her and Kíli, Thranduil's son, and Fíli Thorin did not understand. He resolved to learn before he spoke to this Tauriel.

His next two visitors were not so trying.

Gandalf brought news from the south and a belated explanation for his frequent absences during the quest. The White Council—Gandalf and two others of his order, Elrond, and the Lady of the Golden Wood, an Elven sorceress reputed to be fair as foxglove—had driven the Necromancer from Dol Guldur.

It was an unlikely tale of capture, escape, and magic; Thorin half suspected the wizard had fabricated it out of whole cloth and listened, disgruntled. Until Gandalf shared in strict confidence the true identity of the Necromancer and that he'd found Thráin, dying, a prisoner in the Dark Lord's fortress. A relief it was of a sort to finally hear of his father's fate, for Thorin had long feared the worst. Thráin himself seemed to have been haunted by some ill premonition, seeking out Gandalf in the final months before Azanulbizar—a task he would not be dissuaded from by king or kin.

"And so all your plans have come to fruition," Thorin said, tone carefully neutral, when Gandalf was done. He did not know from whence Gandalf and his brother wizards came, but that they had an agenda of their own, moving those they professed to advise like pieces in an unseen game, was clear. While it had suited Thorin to allow Gandalf to convince him the time was right to reclaim Erebor, an end he, too, desired greatly and the omens favored, it was the death of the dragon, Thorin soon guessed, that most concerned Gandalf.

Now, with the Necromancer unveiled as Sauron, reborn or perhaps never truly destroyed, Gandalf's designs had also been revealed: Smaug slain and unable to ally with a darker power; Dol Guldur emptied of its armies so that its master could be challenged. _Yet in your hand are more cards you have not played_, thought Thorin, eyeing Gandalf, who looked far too unassuming to be believed.

"Oh, much has come to pass that I had no notion of," answered Gandalf, his gaze momentarily canny. "Do not think me infallible, Thorin Oakenshield." Then he sighed and was naught but an old man in gray, weary of his burdens. "I am sorry for your loss, Thorin." Strain had left new lines at the corners of his eyes.

Remembering the glow of candlelight on Gandalf's laughing face in Bag End, his affection for his charges unmistakable, Thorin nodded with a jerk of his head and accepted the wizard's sympathies in the sincerity that they'd been offered. Gandalf fell silent after that but sat with Thorin for a little longer, smoking his pipe, the smell homely and comforting, before he bid Thorin farewell.

Beorn shrugged off Thorin's gratitude with a gruff, "I have no love of orcs," though Thorin could tell it pleased him. Neither did he refuse the gold and silver Thorin insisted was his, saying that he would've had no interest in it before, but he was to be a lord of men, apparently, and certain things were expected of him.

"Some of the Lakemen seem to feel that being able to turn into a bear makes me fit for a lordship," he added at Thorin's surprise. "The fool lot of them's set on following me back to my lands come spring, now that the southern forest has been cleansed. Like ducklings after their mother." Beorn snorted, raking a hand through his wild mane of hair. "There won't be any quiet to be had, with babes squalling and children running about underfoot, their parents 'my lord'-ing me with this or that, day and night."

Thorin raised an eyebrow, simply looking at Beorn until he admitted, grudgingly, "Well, it won't _all_ be so bad." The smile tugging at Beorn's lips put the lie to his words, however. In fact, Thorin rather suspected that Beorn would enjoy the company—babes, children, and parents alike all his to care for. _Same as his bees_, thought Thorin, faintly amused, _his cattle and sheep, his dogs, his horses._ He saw again the skinchanger's paw of a hand cupped huge but gentle around a trusting mouse.

"I believe you'll make a fine lord, Master Beorn," he said. "And the Dwarves of Erebor shall ever be friends to you and yours." An easier alliance than his with Thranduil, to be sure, and one of mutual benefit. With the Lonely Mountain and Dale settled once more, traffic over the old Forest Road would increase; Beorn and his men in the vales of the Anduin could keep open the High Pass and ford south of the Carrock, for which Thorin did not doubt travelers would pay a pretty toll.

"We'll see how good a lord I am," said Beorn with a noncommittal grunt, "though your friendship I'll gladly have. Even if I'm still not overfond of Dwarves." He laughed suddenly, low and rumbling. "Of the three of us—you, me, and the man they call Dragonshooter—you are the only one who intended to be what you now are. Fate never ceases to amaze me." Beorn shook his head, then bent at the waist in a shallow, loose-limbed bow and took his leave with a dry, "My regards, King Under the Mountain."

_Fate..._ The idea prodded at his mind, a hard mass and bruising, as Thorin conferred with Glóin to ready Beorn's share of the treasure for his departure tomorrow. It was a whisper in Thorin's ear as Dwalin reported on the band of goblin stragglers killed a couple days ago by a far ranging patrol and Óin on the prognosis of the worst of the wounded—most were expected to live, thankfully.

Bard and Beorn had won their right to rule through heroism, their followers admiring their courage and strength, but Thorin... The need to reclaim Erebor had burned in his heart so long, a fire that would not be quenched by days of peace in the Blue Mountains, that he feared there were only ashes left and no contentment to be found in new crown or realm. He'd thought nothing short of exile could serve as his penance, a life spent wandering in strange lands as regret ate at his insides like a hungry rat. Yet perhaps this was a crueler sentence. To act out a poor semblance of his once dearest hopes, fully aware he was undeserving of even that much. _To never be free of my doubts..._

He must have dozed off, for it was evening again when he drifted slowly back to consciousness. _Erebor..._ He'd dreamed of walking its halls, empty and echoing. Though the images were fading fast, Thorin remembered his footprints in the dust and crossing an endless narrow bridge, the floor dropping away into a yawning abyss on either side. Steps down and down, down into the dark deep beneath the Mountain. He shivered. _I was searching. Searching for..._

There was a light at his bedside, Thorin noticed, startled, and it was not the steady flame of a candle but a glimmering halo of color, as if a piece of the moon had been caught in crystal and fractured into ten thousand rainbows. His pulse leaped, in an almost nervous anticipation; he knew of but one thing that could create such a light. Propped up against the side of his cot was Orcrist, now in its sheath, and lying benignly atop the table, not far from the edge nearest Thorin, was the Arkenstone.

For a breathless moment, he stared at this splendid jewel that had caused him and his house so much grief. He had not wanted to see the Arkenstone again, wary of falling under its spell once more, and indeed its beauty was as keen as in his memory, unsurpassed by any except, if legend was to be believed, that of the Silmarils. But, after all that had happened, Thorin thought it a cold beauty, indifferent to the suffering of those who loved it.

He turned from the Arkenstone at last and did not regret it. Instead, his eyes were drawn to the sleeping figure sitting on the stool next to him, head resting on folded arms upon his cot. Thorin reached out but wrenched his arm back before his fingers could touch a single hair to clasp his shaking hands together in his lap. He must have made some noise, however, because Bilbo jerked awake. He blinked blearily, one small fist rubbing at his eye.

"Master Baggins," Thorin said quietly. _Bilbo_ was on the tip of his tongue, but perhaps he'd lost his right to that name. "I... trust that you are well?" He studied Bilbo closely, searching head and face for signs of the injury Balin had mentioned, noting Bilbo's wan look, the gauntness of his already slight frame, and wishing he could comb his fingers through Bilbo's hair to the scalp, smooth his palms down Bilbo's arms and legs, his every side and feel the wholeness of flesh and bone under his skin, his clothes, the gift of _mithril_ mail he still wore, glinting at his neck. But Thorin kept his hands clenched in his lap. One had been enough to wrap, choking, around that throat.

"Thorin! Y-You're awake!" Bilbo cried, sounding worried but also inexplicably relieved. "I... I brought you..." His gaze darted from the Arkenstone to his fidgeting fingers, and he spoke in a rush. "I mean, Bard gave it back to me to give back to you before, before he left this morning, and I thought... I made such a great mess of things, trying to stop a battle that was fought despite or, or maybe _because_ I acted the fool, and now Fíli and Kíli—" His shoulders hunched miserably, as Thorin stiffened against the gutting stab of pain.

Bilbo's voice when he continued was tiny, thin and wavering. "I wanted to set right the wrong I'd done you, but it, it's too late, isn't it?" He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes, scrubbing fiercely, to Thorin's horror, at the tears gathered there.

"_No_," said Thorin, desperate that Bilbo heed him. "Master Bag—" He couldn't call him that, distancing them like the strangers they hadn't been since that lovely dawn upon the Carrock. "_Bilbo._ Listen to me. What happened wasn't your fault." _It was mine._ "Fíli and Kíli... Their"—why was it so hard to force the truth from his tongue?—"their deaths were not of your making." Bilbo didn't seem entirely convinced, his face pale and pinched, but he sat a bit straighter, determinedly wiping his eyes dry. _He is a kindly little soul_, Thorin thought, _and braver than even he knows._

"If you acted the fool, I was many times one," he continued, after clearing his throat once, twice. "I... I would take back my words and deeds at the gates. I cannot say whether you did good or ill—there were forces greater than you, greater than I moving us all—but I am sorry I doubted you so, doubted your heart, that has ever shown me more care than I deserve."

Rarely had Thorin felt so awkward, fumbling and uncertain. The fluttering of earlier had returned, a moth caged by his ribs, and every syllable was rusted metal scraping over stone, his voice raw to his ears. "I was cruel, unforgivably cruel, and though I have lost your friendship, I... I wish for us to, to part in—" His throat closed, to Thorin's shame, and he couldn't, _couldn't_ finish, staring fixedly at the gently pointed curve of Bilbo's ear where it poked through his hair, breathing a harsh rasp.

"You were not yourself," Bilbo said, words slow and clear. His expressive features, in contrast, creased with emotion Thorin could not read before firming in resolve. "I won't pretend that you didn't scare me and, and make me scared _for_ you, but you have my friendship still, Thorin." Then Bilbo stuttered, suddenly anxious. "If, if that's what you want, that is."

That was more than Thorin had dared hope for. "Yes, yes, of course," he stammered. "I would... would very much like to be friends." Guilt pried his mouth open again, even as his mind screamed that he should keep his silence and not ruin this unlooked-for reconciliation. "But, Bilbo, I _was_ myself. You must understand that. I would not have you absolve me of responsibility for my actions, no matter how dearly I—"

At the same time, Bilbo blurted, "I'm leaving, Thorin. Tomorrow morning, with Gandalf and Beorn." He sounded as guilty as Thorin did. "That makes me a rather shabby friend, I know. Not, not staying to help you when there's so much to be done and, and waiting this long to tell you, but I—"

They both stopped, coming to a mutual realization that they were each having a different conversation. Thorin coughed, grimacing, as Bilbo flushed red to his ears. Bilbo recovered quicker than did Thorin and, wondrously, began laughing, chagrined but genuinely amused. A hint of a smile was tucked into the corners of his mouth. An answering smile curled Thorin's lips up at the ends, his muscles loosening.

"What a fine pair we are!" Bilbo shook his head wryly before sobering. "Thorin, we've all said and done things we didn't mean, would never say or do if we were thinking straight. I'm not going to hold that against you. Not when I _know_ you and that you are _good_ and, and honorable, a loyal friend and kind, too." A teasing air crept cautiously into the way Bilbo glanced at him. "Even if you _are_ prone to dramatics, too proud to be outdone by anyone in fits of temper." He arched an eyebrow at Thorin.

Face now buried in one palm, Thorin chuckled weakly and a little unwillingly. _Kind, he says._ "That's... certainly a _unique_ perspective, Master Baggins." He sighed. "I do not understand how you can forgive me so easily, Bilbo, but I won't question it any further and will simply be grateful for it." _And you_, Thorin added to himself, trying to commit this debt to some part of him deeper than memory. Bilbo nodded in approval, arms crossed over his chest.

At Thorin's tentative, "Tell me why you would leave us so soon, when the mountain passes will be closed to you until spring," however, he ran a trembling hand through his hair, slumping tiredly. The following lull stretched so long that Thorin feared he wouldn't reply.

"I could tell you that I miss the Shire," Bilbo finally said. "Its rolling green hills and lazy days in the sun. My books and my garden, my cozy armchair by the fire in Bag End, my pipe and a nice cup of tea near at hand." His tone was wistful, and Thorin had to bite the inside of his cheek to not interrupt. _We can make you a home here_, he thought. _Or in Dale. Whatever you want. Just..._ "And, and that would be true..." Bilbo worried at his lower lip, hesitating, then took a deep breath. "But it would be a lie, too. The truth is..."

With a visible effort, he met and held Thorin's concerned gaze. "The real truth is, Thorin, I can't enter the Mountain without remembering that dreadful dragon, his, his _voice_"—Bilbo shuddered, shrinking in on himself—"wicked words and fire in the night, all those people who _burned_ b-because... A-And Dale's not much better, the ground red and black, bodies stacked high like, like cordwood, Fíli and Kíli—" He turned his head away, breath hitching, and whispered, "You... How can you _stand_ it?"

_Because I must._ That would not help Bilbo, though, altogether too grim for his ears. "Erebor is my home," Thorin said instead, "as the Shire is yours." Even as Thorin made the comparison, he wanted to deny it. For it meant he could never keep Bilbo from the warren of a house under the hill and its round green door, grass growing lush on the verge, every nook and cranny within filled with mementos. Treasures more precious than gold. "No matter how much... darkness"—_war, death, sickness_—"it has known, if I... can be of use, I would not abandon it." To Thorin's dismay, Bilbo looked not the least bit comforted by this, his face a wretched picture of shame.

Silently cursing his inability to find the right words, Thorin exhaled sharply and tried again. "But... I have an obligation to my people, who have not seen fit to release me from it. You, Bilbo, _you_ have more than fulfilled your obligations to the Company, and now it is past time for you to put yourself first." _I'm not getting through to him_, Thorin thought at the soft, wounded noise that escaped Bilbo. His nails dug into his palms as he resisted the panicky urge to pull Bilbo into an embrace until all his ills had been drawn from him, before they could poison that gentle spirit, as Thorin had turned sour and brittle.

"Master Baggins," said Thorin, purposely stern, "as your _friend_, I want you to seek your peace, wherever you think it lies." He swallowed, head bowing, and compelled his heart to let go. The lesson of possession's perils was not one he would ever allow himself to forget. "While I can't claim that I won't miss you, sorely, I'd rather you be content half a world away than, than shackled to your pain at my side."

And because he was weak still, Thorin added, voice muted, "If... If one day you wish to... I hope you'll feel things have changed for the better." In his mind's eye, he saw himself standing proud next to Bilbo on the ramparts where he'd come so close to destroying whatever ties of affection bound them, a hand sure on Bilbo's shoulder and the valley spread like a jeweled mosaic at their feet, rich once more with birds, blossoms and fruit, white sails catching the sun all along the blue ribbon of the River Running. _Years. It'll be years._ Defeated, Thorin could only promise, "You shall always be welcome here."

"Oh, Thorin," Bilbo said, sniffling, "you, you great fool of a—" Later, he'd blame his inattentiveness on the puzzling note of exasperation in Bilbo's voice. Though, he admitted, he was not usually so slow to react to sudden motion, too busy berating himself for upsetting Bilbo further. Either way, he was taken completely by surprise when Bilbo all but leaped the short distance between them, body landing half on his, half on the cot and arms wrapping tight around him. His breath blew out of him like he'd been punched hard in the stomach; he tensed, hands twitching, aching to the tips of his fingers to return Bilbo's touch. But Bilbo was too near, curls of hair tickling Thorin's cheek and little puffs of air the shell of his ear. Thorin didn't trust himself not to clutch, to bruise.

"Thank you. For understanding," Bilbo said into Thorin's hair, sounding as if he were weeping and laughing at once. "But this is not goodbye—not, not forever, at least. That I need a, a bit of time away doesn't mean I don't need my friends." When Bilbo released him, standing and straightening his clothes with an embarrassed cough, one hand brushing quickly at his eyes, Thorin mourned the loss of that warm weight against him. "Balin tells me there's likely to be messengers or what have you traveling between Erebor and the Blue Mountains every couple months." Thorin nodded, thinking of trade and gold and his people coming home, families reunited, Dís, _Dís_.

"Well, I intend to take full advantage of it, and I expect you to do so, too." Bilbo's tone was imperious, the ring of steel underneath, and his stance challenging, a far cry from the sheltered Halfling Thorin had mocked as a grocer. He was no warrior, more apt yet to flail with his sword than cut, but he had treated with kings and defied them. "Have your messengers stop by the Shire. Tea is at four, but they can visit at any time, so long as they don't look to empty my larder." His brows drew down into a thunderous scowl at Thorin. Who huffed to learn that Bilbo _still_ had not forgiven the Company for doing him the _favor_ of eating his food before it went to waste, gone rotten and stale during what was expected to be a months-long absence.

"I shall command them to exercise restraint," Thorin intoned, smiling helplessly at Bilbo's outrage. _I had nothing to do with his empty larder._ Bilbo, however, seemed to have forgotten this fact, inordinately pleased with receiving Thorin's royal protection. He smiled back at Thorin, eyes curiously soft.

"You must write to me, Thorin," he said, just as Thorin was beginning to feel odd under that tender focus. "I want to hear of all that you're up to." Frowning contemplatively, Bilbo added, "Unless it's a state secret, of course. Or too, too _Dwarvish_ for a Hobbit to follow, as I'll ask that you mind my ignorance about who's who among the lords of the Iron Hills, the customary arrangement of mining rotas, and such."

"Balin?" asked Thorin, amused. He chuckled at Bilbo's heated, frustrated _yes!_ Then stopped, abruptly, to marvel at his own good humor, hearing a lightness to that one brief exchange that he had not noticed was missing from his others until now. Dread again rose in him at this inexorable separation.

"And one day," Bilbo said, catching Thorin's eye, "I'll return. I promise, Thorin." His gaze was steady and very determined, clear as the air at the Mountain's peak in fine weather, and Thorin let himself believe, for Bilbo's courage had never failed them.

That night was one of the few in the ensuing month that Thorin spent well. He'd spooned mouthfuls of the hearty stew Bombur had left warming on a hearth for him, for once not bothered that it tasted of dust and ashes, as Bilbo talked animatedly of his plans upon reaching the Shire. At Thorin's insistence, Bilbo accepted a small box of jewelry, to be chosen on the morrow before his departure, in addition to the two chests, one filled with gold and the other with silver, that Thorin was glad to find Bard had already pressed on him. Bilbo's sputtering protests that he'd never be able to get all this treasure home without war and murder along the way died at Thorin's wry observation that Beorn had enough gold of his own to tempt robbers. Who were to be pitied, not feared, if they thought to attack a skinchanger and a wizard. Thorin was much gratified by the rueful shake of Bilbo's head at that, a grin spreading slowly across his face as he conceded Thorin's logic; Gandalf and Beorn would be _quite_ peeved at having to do more fighting.

And, as the hour grew late, Bilbo climbed onto the cot beside Thorin with no qualms, no hesitation—a fist had squeezed Thorin's heart in his chest at this easy show of trust—sharp tongue giving some unpleasant relations of his a thorough lashing until he fell asleep mid-sentence, sprawled on his front, one small hand curled loosely on the pillows between them. Thorin tucked the blankets around Bilbo, daring, finally, to smooth down a couple stray hairs as Bilbo snuffled at his feather-light touch. He hoped Bilbo's dreams were sweet, of the rolling hills of the Shire, green in the sunshine, and the snug rooms and passages of his home. Thorin did not know when he, too, fell asleep, watching Bilbo in mingled care and regret. No dreams greeted him after he closed his eyes.

**· · ·**

_TBC_

* * *

><p>I've taken some liberties with the ages of the Dwarves in the Company. According to <em>The Lord of the Rings<em>, Appendix A, "Durin's Folk," Thorin is actually the eldest member, born in III 2746 and a sprightly 195(!) years old at the time of the Quest of Erebor. Kíli is the youngest, aged 77 (b. III 2864), with Fíli only five years older than him. Thorin's cousins are, in order from oldest to youngest, Balin (178), Dwalin (169), Óin (167), and Glóin (158). No birth dates are given for Dori, Nori, and Ori, distant kinsmen of Thorin, or Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur, descended from the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm. However, from comments in _The Hobbit_ about the relative ages of the Dwarves, they all must be at least fifty years older than Fíli.

Now, these ages don't seem to jive well, IMO, on certain points—notably, Thorin and Balin's relationship—with Peter Jackson's portrayal of the Dwarves, upon which my characterization is largely based. Though, granted, the timeline of the film adaptation is... _hinky_. Long story short, I felt a little reshuffling of the Company ages would better suit the narrative and my convenience, of course. So, as far as this AU is concerned, the Dwarves, from oldest to youngest: Balin and Óin, who are more or less contemporaries; Dwalin, Thorin, and Glóin, close enough in age (and rank) to be peers; Dori and Nori, Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur, in whatever order the reader prefers, provided the relative ages within each family group are kept straight; Fíli, Kíli, and Ori, the babes of the bunch. Dori, I suppose, is just naturally a silver fox. Either that or Nori's criminal proclivities have worried his hair prematurely white.

On a more somber note, after waffling a bit about whether to kill Fíli and Kíli, as in canon, I finally decided to do so because politics! With Thorin alive as king and Dáin dead in his place, there was a lot of friction between the Dwarves originally of Erebor and the Dwarves from the Iron Hills new come to the Mountain that I just didn't think I could handle well on top of developing a credible Thorin/Bard romance, with Bard a recovering victim of rape per the prompt. Luckily for me, Thorin Stonehelm was born in III 2866 (_The Lord of the Rings_, Appendix A, "Durin's Folk"), making him a mere two years younger than Kíli at the time of the Quest. Thorin could then name his namesake heir, appeasing Dáin's followers while also observing the laws of inheritance, assuming primogeniture, but only if his sister-sons did not survive the Battle of Five Armies. Hey, I at least spared Thorin the guilt of knowing Fíli and Kíli fell "defending him with shield and body" (_The Hobbit_, Chapter XVIII, "The Return Journey"). Thanks for that depressing image, Tolkien!


End file.
